Killed in the Line of Duty Sapper Harold Walter Thompson Service Number 2001843………..
Harold Walter Thompson was born on 19 February 1920, in Romford in Essex, the third oldest of six children born to parents Harry Walter Thompson and Charlotte May Wheal. Baby Harold was baptised just two months later on 29 April 1920 at St. Edward the Confessor Roman Catholic Church in Romford. Just one year later, the 1921 census records the family living at 5, London Road, Romford, Essex and living at home with Harold and his parents are three of his siblings, older brother Harry, older sister May and younger sister Violet. Harold’s father Harry is recorded as a General Labourer for The Great Eastern Railway at Stratford.
(1921 Census FindMyPast)
The photograph below is of London Road, Romford, taken around 1905. It shows a bygone era of carefree cyclists enjoying their time without the threat of any vehicles being on the road at the time. Who they are and what their story was is a journey for your own imagination.
The photograph includes three pubs which can be seen in the background, The Compasses, The Sun Inn and barely visible, right at the end, in the centre of the image, The New Mill Inn on the corner of Waterloo Road. It is the Truman Brewery pub, the Sun Inn, which stands out, with the advertisement “Fred C. Ottley. Wine and Spirit Merchant. GOOD STABLES”. Fred Ottley was landlord of the Sun Inn from 1898 until it was rebuilt in 1937. All of these sites would have been familiar to Harold and his family and maybe they even frequented some of the pubs along London Road. The brick wall and outbuilding visible on the left of the photograph belongs to the Cottons estate field which would become Cottons Park in the 1920s, no doubt a familiar place for young children to play growing up. I can just imagine Harold and his siblings enjoying their time playing in the park, without a care in the world.
Unfortunately, I have been unable to trace any living descendants for Harold and given the fact the he never married and died at such a young age, there is a large gap in the story for Harold Walter Thompson. The next record that I was able to find was the 1939 Register which shows Harold living at home with his parents and younger brother Edward at Danny’s Bungalow, Bird Lane, in Hornchurch, Essex and his occupation is recorded as a labourer.
(The National Archives; Kew, London, England; 1939 Register; Reference: Rg 101/1526i)
Bird Lane although being in the registration district of Hornchurch was actually in fact in Upminster and the picture below shows how remote the area was. From the maps and pictures below, kindly provided by Tony Benton from his wonderful website http://www.upminsterhistory.net/ and using the 1939 Register to help locate the properties mentioned, I believe that Danny’s Bungalow is one of the bungalows behind Chapman’s Farm on the map attached. River Drive, another road mentioned in the 1939 Register, is on the other side of Hall Lane. Which helps us with the precise location of the Thompson’s property.
(Picture and Map Courtesy of Tony Benton’s Picture Collection – Old Upminster )
His Army records show that he enlisted on 15th February 1940 and was initially assigned to the 563 Field Company before moving to 501 Field Company on 18 May 1940. After receiving his basic training, he was assigned to section 87 of the Royal Engineers Bomb Disposal team and attached to 10th battalion The Kings Regiment (Liverpool) where he was assigned the military number 2001843. Below are the Army records surrounding the death of Sapper Harold Walter Thompson and these records can be found in the collection UK, World War II Army Casualty Lists, 1939-1945 on Ancestry.
Harold was one of six bomb disposal men who were tragically killed in August 1940 trying to defuse an unexploded bomb that was dropped close to the town of Nantwich during WW2. He is remembered alongside his fellow Bomb Disposal colleagues who died in August 1940, at Alvaston Hall in Cheshire, the closest location to where the six brave men were killed.
You can read the full story of how they died here:
The Story of the Six Brave Royal Engineers Who Died at Nantwich
Harold is buried at Hornchurch Cemetery, Section A, Grave 1337.
Despite a large amount of censorship of newspaper reporting during the war, shortly after he died, the following newspaper article appeared in the Chelmsford Chronicle dated 30 August 1940:
YOUNG SOLDIER’S DEATH – Mr and Mrs Harry Thompson, of Danny’s Bungalow, Bird Lane Upminster, have received a telegram stating that their second son, Private Harold Walter Thompson, R.E., has been killed while on active service. Private Thompson, who was 20 years of age, had been in the Army only four months. He was buried at Hornchurch Cemetery on Monday, when the coffin was covered with the Union Jack. Officers and men of his unit sent floral tributes. The chief mourners were; The parents; Mr E.Thompson, brother; the misses Eileen, Violet and May Thompson, sisters; Mr J.W. Thompson; Mr and Mrs P. Thompson, Mrs L. Thompson, uncles and aunts. Mr and Mrs Thompson received information in May, that their eldest son, who is 25, was missing in France.
Despite the tragedy of losing their son Harold Walter Thomson in the explosion at Nantwich in August 1940, further research into what happened to Mr and Mrs Thompson’s eldest son, Harry Samuel John Thompson shows that he did thankfully return from the battlefields of France and went onto live a good life before passing away in 1989, aged 75.
The Thompson family, like many others at the time, understood what it meant to serve King and Country. Harold was a man who was willing to sacrifice his own needs and put the needs of his Country ‘first.’ We should never ever forget what these brave men and women sacrificed in the defence of our Country in its darkest hours. I hope that by telling his story that we help to keep his memory alive and that he will always be remembered.
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